Putin Presses Extension of Cease-Fire in Ukraine

Relatives attended the funeral of Nikolay Pavliyenko, 83, who was killed by shelling on Sunday, in the town of Pryvillya in the Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine.

Shamil Zhumatov / Reuters

By NEIL MacFARQUHAR and ANDREW ROTH

June 24, 2014

MOSCOW — President Vladimir V. Putin said Tuesday that a temporary cease-fire in Ukraine should be extended, just hours after he called on the upper house of Russia’s Parliament to rescind a March resolution authorizing the use of his country’s armed forces there.

Both moves came as the United States and some European leaders warned that Russia faced a third, stiffer round of economic sanctions, specifically targeting sectors like banking and high technology, if it did not do more to end the Ukraine crisis. European leaders are set to discuss the sanctions during a summit meeting in Brussels on Friday.

In eastern Ukraine, the cease-fire unexpectedly accepted by pro-Russian separatists on Monday night proved shaky, with a spokesman for the Ukrainian armed forces accusing the rebels of shooting down a military helicopter, killing all nine people aboard.

The Mi-8 helicopter was carrying equipment and specialists to monitor the cease-fire near the rebel-held city of Slovyansk, a hotbed of resistance, when it was struck by a missile fired from a portable air defense system, said Vladislav Seleznyov, the spokesman, in a statement posted online.

The attack on the helicopter took place in the hills around the town of Karachun on the outskirts of Slovyansk, Mr. Seleznyov said.

The rebel militia in Slovyansk is run by a shadowy military commander named Igor Strelkov, who was not present at negotiations on the cease-fire in the eastern city of Donetsk on Monday evening. But an aide to the prime minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic said in an interview that Mr. Strelkov was aware of the temporary truce.

Maintaining a truce could prove tough. There is minimal trust between the government in Kiev, the capital, and the patchwork of militias and rebellious political organizations that have laid siege to eastern Ukraine.

Earlier Tuesday, Mr. Seleznyov said in an interview that rebels had continued using mortars to attack several government checkpoints near Slovyansk. He said there had been isolated fighting near the border between Russia and Ukraine as well. Two soldiers were killed in the clashes, he said.

At the United Nations, Ivan Simonovic, the assistant secretary-general for human rights, told a Security Council briefing on Tuesday that 423 people, including soldiers and civilians, had died in the conflict in east Ukraine from April 15 to June 7.

Speaking in Vienna, Mr. Putin said that a weeklong cease-fire announced by President Petro O. Poroshenko of Ukraine on Friday and accepted by the separatists was insufficient. He said he had told Ukraine, “To declare a cease-fire is not enough; it is necessary to start substantive talks on the nature of the problem.”

Mr. Putin said declaring a cease-fire and asking the rebels to disarm without addressing their long-term political grievances would yield nothing. The separatists want increased autonomy for Donetsk and Luhansk, and the government has said it is amenable to changes in the Constitution, though whether that will be enough to satisfy their opponents is an open question.

“If we see there are substantive talks, so that people in eastern Ukraine can finally understand how their legal interests will be guaranteed, then there is a high possibility of success,” Mr. Putin said at a news conference.

Mr. Putin said he was pleased by the first contacts on Monday between the Kiev authorities and the rebel representatives of Donetsk and Luhansk. “No big agreements were reached, but the fact that the dialogue has begun is a highly important moment,” he said.

The Russian president listed some of his standard complaints about Ukraine, including that it had not done enough to disarm a rabidly anti-Russian group called Right Sector. Without that, Mr. Putin said, it did not make sense to call on the militias in the east to disarm.

Mr. Putin was in Vienna to help push for a new, southern route for Russian gas exports in the face of European opposition. Russia is seeking alternative routes for its troubled pipeline to Europe through Ukraine, with the Ukrainian portion of the exports again shut down over pricing and political disputes.

Before Mr. Putin left for Vienna, his spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, issued a statement saying that Mr. Putin had sent a formal request to the Federation Council, the upper house of Russia’s Parliament, to rescind what was tantamount to an endorsement to invade Ukraine passed on March 1. Russia used its military that month to annex Crimea, at the time a Ukrainian region, and there has been tension over a possible similar move in the troubled southeastern region of Ukraine.

In his statement, Mr. Peskov said the move to rescind the authorization was “aimed at normalizing the situation in the eastern regions of Ukraine.”

The changed position was largely symbolic: Mr. Putin can get whatever he needs from Parliament at any time, and members of the upper house said it would make the change on Wednesday. But the change was one step requested by the United States and other Western powers to indicate that Moscow was serious in seeking a negotiated solution in Ukraine.

It came after a rough deal was worked out Monday involving all sides for a temporary cease-fire lasting through Friday. Russia had been pressuring Ukraine to talk directly to the rebels, and Mr. Putin’s public move to take the Russian armed forces out of the equation was evidently a means to endorse the first results from the talks.

In Kiev, Mr. Poroshenko issued a statement calling the move by Mr. Putin “the first practical step” by Moscow to resolve the crisis in the east since the Russian leader endorsed the peace plan.

The West has accused Moscow of supporting, if not directing, the separatist movement by dispatching Russian mercenaries. Moscow has denied any direct role and has said it has no control over volunteer fighters. But the United States has been leading the effort to impose new sanctions.

The Poroshenko peace plan proposes amnesty for rebel fighters who have not committed serious crimes, as well as safe passage for mercenaries seeking to return to Russia. It also calls for decentralization of the national government, which would allow for greater self-rule in the east, a critical Russian demand.